#who would javert have dated

[for-the-love-of-javert]

If Hugo hadn't been such a mean bugger and had bothered to allow Javert to have a girlfriend in one of the female characters in the 'The Brick'

I may have missed one or two one of them I think would have been too old for Javert if I missed any others (My brain just hasn't been awake all day today so I apologize) it wasn't intentional but feel free to add them in the comments.

This was done just out of curiosity and for fun. I'm having a little break from reading 'The Brick' I've read quite a bit tonight. A few more chapters then I'm off to sleep.

Also please excuse my typos. I noticed about 15 minutes after posting and can't correct it.

[do-you-ship-it-polls]

Which Toxic Yaoi is the best

Sequel to the toxic yuri poll. I deeply apologise if some of these are not toxic, i went off of the propaganda

Propaganda under the cut!

BbKaz (Big Boss/Kazuhira Miller)

they have multitudes.. you can ship it as something goofy and fluffy or as the most toxic yaoi of all time and theyre both pretty reasonable interpretations. they go on a date together and have sex in a cardboard box on a beach in canon and a bunch of other crazy shit. their relationship spans 20 years so they span from honeymooning to divorced to one trying to kill the other etc. "love loses" the ship they make me insane

Flash/Reverse Flash

"It was ME Barry, I jerked you off at supersonic speeds so it would seem like you nutted at just a woman's touch!"

Possibly the most toxic yaoi of all time

SuzaLuLu (Kururugi Suzaku/Lelouch Lamperougue)

TOXIC YAOI TOXIC YAOI

SaruMi (Saruhiko Fushimi/Misaki Yata)

Toxic yaoi, obsessive boy joins a gang with his best friend but then his best friend makes other friends in the gang so he joins up with an enemy gang instead. Normal behavior.

Valvert (Jean Valjean/Javert)

They’re so obsessed with each other (especially javert to valjean) it’s like half of the plot. Pinnacle of toxic old man yaoi. Produces the funniest plot point in the show: Valjean (escaped convict in disguise as a mayor and businessman) saves someone by lifting a cart he was trapped under and Javert (cop trying to catch Valjean) goes “Damn girl… you remind me of this guy…. He’s the only guy I’ve ever seen who’s as swole and jacked as you”

Lawlight (Light/L)

"L and Light are the founding fathers of toxic yaoi" is what people WANT you to believe but these poor men are being slandered... You see it's ackshually totally heterosexual to give your bestie (who's also your mortal enemy) a foot massage while he he makes soft little grunting noises and wipes the water droplets from your rain-soaked hair all while a soft melancholic piano track is accompanying this surprisingly tender moment between the two of you- IF it's a religious callback to Jesus and Judas. It's just a Bible reference bro. No homo. 🤓☝

Anyhow don't google the Japanese version of "Playing his Game" (which is called "Inside of him" in Japanese) from the Death Note Musical. I assure you there is absolutely nothing gay about those lyrics.

Wdym people love shipping two mortal enemies with an unhealthy obsessive murderous rivaly??? What is the world coming to... Besides Light is clearly heterosexual. His lack of interest in women is because he's a based sigma male obviously...

and additional reason here but this one is a spoiler

Foot washing scene. The musical. God, they're so obsessed with each other. When L dies Light loses his main drive, his passion- being Kira isn't fun anymore without L, he isn't having a good time even though he won their battle of wits. Light being L's first friend. L being... really, the first person to understand Light. Theyre insane I love them

[aroseinmisery1248]

Would anyone read a multimedia fanfic where its pretty much retelling the entire (book?) plot of Les Mis but with "social media" posts and stuff? There's this website I found called prankshit.com where you can make fake screenshots of stuff, and I thought it would be fun to test it out. I wanted to assess any potential interest before doing it. Here are some ideas I had, feel free to suggest more (please try to keep it book canon, although I would be using movie clips for profile pics and such):

-all the Victor Hugo/Grantaire rants are like 4 hour long YouTube videos with click-baity titles

-Cosette and Marius video chats, text messages, etc.

-Les Amis advertising the rebellion on Facebook

-Any serious letters and stuff are just on gmail, idk

-Monologues or private thoughts are like in note app (archive of course)

-Any fights (Thenardiers and Valjean, for example) are like on Twitter probably (I'm not on there but from what I've heard it's a lot of old people arguing lol)

-Fantine and Tholomyes have a shared Instagram account pre-breakup (aka he leaves)

-Cosette and her aesthetic Pinterest board (when she finds out she's pretty and gets all the dresses and stuff)

-Should I steal the gay dating app idea for Javert? I'm sorry, idk who to give credits to for the idea but somebody posted about him seeing an ad like "we'll help you find the man you've been looking for all your life!" and so on.

-Courfeyrac on Tiktok. I am not on there either, and he isn't even in the book much. But it makes sense to me.

-LES AMIS GROUP CHAT

Okay that's all for now!

[nortism]

Nor's Les Mis Fic Recommendations

I've been scouring les mis ao3 for a few months now so here are my fav fics I've found. I've tried my best to tag tumblrs where I can but let me know if you are the author of any of these and I'll tag you!

Three Days (or The One Where Javert and Valjean Take a Road Trip Through France and Raise a Child) by zamwessel

Rating: E

Ships: Javert/Jean Valjean

Summary:

Javert calls what he thinks is Valjean's bluff about needing three days to find the child Cosette and intercede for her. The Inspector comes along for the ride -- and gets much more than he bargained for, in the process.

Notes: First Les Mis fic I ever read and its an absolute banger. It's pretty much exactly what it says on the tin and I'm a sucker for a kid fic so I absolutely adored it.

A Change of Bizarre Kind by M_Moonshade

Rating: E

Ships: Javert/Jean Valjean

Summary:

Six months ago, Doctor Henry Jekyll sought to escape the dramatics of London by coming to M-sur-M. Tonight his murderer pays a visit to the Mayor Madeline. (Being the Curious Case of Inspector Javert and Mister Hyde)

Notes: Criminally underrated. Jekyll and Hyde AU but I went in knowing very little about that book and I could understand what was going on. Each chapter contains bits from the past and present day until the timelines eventually add up which makes the main mystery all the more compelling. Also Fantine is alive and well which is always nice.

Our Souls Still in Fetters by Cinaed

Rating: E

Ships: Javert/Jean Valjean

Summary:

After Javert is assigned to discover a blackmailer within a public-house that caters to men who prefer other men, Valjean is unexpectedly drawn into the case. Together they must stop the blackmailer before any lives can be ruined...including their own.

Notes: This author has so many great Valvert fics but this one is probably my favourite. There's the classic "undercover as a couple" trope as well as old timey gay bars. Also a huge fan of how this author portrays Cosette and Valjean's relationship.

In Defiance of all Geometry by idiopathicsmile

Rating: T

Ships: Combeferre/Enjolras/Grantaire

Summary:

Amis House might not be the biggest student co-op, or the fanciest, but it's got something all its own. Specifically, smoke damage on the kitchen ceiling from that time Courfeyrac lit a political pamphlet on fire. In which there are secrets, pining, pancakes, and revelations, and sometimes the shortest distance between three points is not a triangle but a circle.

Notes: I love a good poly fic and this is one of the best. Also just a generally fun and wholesome friendship fic. Definitely a nice comforting read after all the old man angst I've got on here.

Gimme Gimme Gimme (A Man After Midnight) by Need_To_Comment_Rising (@aromantic-enjolras)

Rating: T

Ships: Courfeyrac/Enjolras, Combeferre/Courfeyrac (Its complicated)

Summary:

Enjolras takes a swig of his drink with everyone else, and then smirks at Courfeyrac over the rim of his glass. "You didn't seem to mind much me being bossy yesterday night when I had you in my bed..." At his side, Grantaire chokes on his drink and starts coughing. But how did we get here, you might ask? Well, let’s rewind. ------- Enjolras and Courfeyrac have had a friends with benefits arrangement for a while. But when Coureyrac starts dating Combeferre, Enjolras is left with the question of where he fits in the new status quo...

Notes: Another poly fic with aromantic!Enjolras. I love fics with unconventional relationship dynamics as well as people actually communciating with each other (though not before there's been some hijinks ofc). Criminally underrated.

How Marius (Painstakingly) Won the Hand of Mlle. Fauchelevent by writingsyrup (@syrupsyche)

Rating: G

Ships: Cosette/Marius

Summary:

When setting out to woo his beloved Cosette, Marius had never imagined that it would bring him to this: sitting at a dining table next to her grim-faced father, and staring at the marble that was Enjolras picking at his peas. Or; Enjolras and Cosette are siblings in 19th century France. Marius has to deal with the consequences of this.

Notes: Probably the best Marius characterisation I've ever read, he's just so awkward and weird bless him. I love a good awkward "meeting the parents" and this filled that hole in my heart. Is part of a wider series but can be read as a standalone.

Omnia mutantur, nihil interit by Apathy and saltedpin

Rating: M

Ships: Javert/Jean Valjean, Cosette/Marius Pontmercy

Summary:

Valjean's panting breath does not belong to him. He scrambles out of the bed and stumbles on too-light feet to the mirror in the corner, although he already knows what he will see. Peering back at him from behind a curtain of dark hair, wide-eyed, is Éponine Thénardier. Jean Valjean awakens one morning from uneasy dreams to find that something quite unexpected has happened during the night.

Notes: Cosette and Javert get bodyswapped and Marius is weirdly into it, if that's not enough to convince you to read this fic then idk how to help you. Not normally a huge body swap fan but this was absolutely hilarious as well as having some genuinely sweet moments. Also Theodule is there which means something to some people.

It's Not the Same Anymore by ShameDumpster (@shamedumpster)

Rating: T

Ships: Enjolras/Grantaire

Summary:

Grantaire is a bookstore clerk in his late twenties, and to everyone’s eternal disbelief, a father. It’s been years since he’s seen anyone from his former group of friends, after a falling out cleaved him from the ABC, but everything changes when Enjolras walks into his bookstore. Can they rekindle their friendship, or something more, while they both come to terms with how their lives have changed over the past decade?

Notes: SO SO GOODDD!! Top tier slowburn kid fic, I could wax poetic about it for days. Had me gripped from start to finish.

Acts of Mercy by cruisedirector and Dementordelta

Rating: M

Ships: Javert/Jean Valjean

Summary:

After witnessing and reporting a murder, Javert is dismissed from the police and takes a job protecting the women in a brothel, where many of his long-held ideas about justice are challenged.

Notes: Breaking, man from the 1800s finds out that life for women is hard. Such a solid redemption arc fic with some really memorable ocs.

Lynx's Claws and Wolf's Mane by Kaleran

Rating: T

Ships: None

Summary:

When he is older, when he is a prison guard, he thinks back to his childhood and realizes he had been considerably fortunate. "Prison is no place for a girl like you," his mother told him often, usually fussing with what rags they could use for clothing. "Forgive me for this, draga mea." And so, instead of a daughter, she pretended to have a son.

Notes: Completely canon compliant except Javert is trans and the impact that has on the story really adds an extra layer to his character that I find really compelling. Warning, it is very depressing bc canon.

[expired-applejuice]

Incorrect quotes part 4

Javert: hold the fuck up!

Les Amis: *hugs Grantaire aka their fuck up*

-

Valjean: *shatters a window and climbs through it*

Valjean: *turns around and helps Cosette through it* Breaking and entering is wrong Cosette.

Cosette: Okay.

-

Combeferre, trying to get Enjolras out of bed: Don't make me get the water bucket.

Enjolras: You wouldn't.

Courfeyrac: *walking past dripping wet* Yes, he would.

-

Montparnasse: What if fairies were real?

Jehan: What?

Montparnasse: Faries. What if they were actually real?

Jehan: W-wait...faries aren't r-real?

Montparnasse: Of course they're not-

Jehan: "tearing up*

Montparnasse: HAHAHA TRICKED YOU FARIES ARE REAL JUST KIDDING! Please don't cry I love you

-

Bossuet: You know, I'm starting to regret showing you how that blender works.

Grantaire, drinking toast: Why do you say that?

Courfeyrac: ooh can I have some?

-

Bossuet: COURFEYRAC DID YOU EAT THE COOKIES I MADE

Courfeyrac: there was cookies?!

Bossuet: yes. And you ate them

Courfeyrac: no I didn't

Bossuet: then where are they?

Joly, walking in: *mouth full* these are some good cookies

-

Bahorel: I'm going to bed.

Feuilly: It's noon.

Bahorel: Time isn't real.

-

Enjolras: Grantaire, you risked your life to save me!

Grantaire: And I'd do it again! And perhaps a third time! But that would be it. <3

-

Javert: Alright. Time for a new team-building exercise. We're going to put everything we love into this box.

Montparnasse: Can I put Jehan in the box?

Javert: No.

Courfeyrac: Can I put Jehan in the box?

Javert. No.

Grantaire: Can I-

Javert: No one can put Jehan in the box!!

Enjolras: This is a terrible team-building exercise!

-

Grantaire: So, you like cats?

Enjolras: Yeah, I do. They're cute.

Grantaire: *slowly pushes a glass of the counter*

-

Enjolras: Combeferre, I told you to take out the trash.

Combeferre: Oh, right! Sorry!

Combeferre: Courfeyrac, will you go on a date with me?

Courfeyrac:

-

Combeferre: Okay, I'm going to get the wedding cake.

Courfeyrac: Perfect, while you do that I'll check on the ring bear.

Combeferre: ...

Combeferre: You mean ring bearER, right?

Courfeyrac: ...

Combeferre: Look me in the eyes and tell me you are not going to bring a dangerous wild animal to our wedding.

-

Musichetta: Isn't it amazing what friends learn from one another?

Joly: I learn a lot from Grantaire because he makes so many mistakes.

-

Grantaire: Why were you up yesterday until 3am?

Bahorel: How did you know I was up until 3am?

Feuilly: everyone could hear you clapping to the FRIENDS theme song every 25 minutes.

-

Grantaire: Whoa, you're being a little-

Combeferre, who hasn't slept in 4 days because he was studying: Truculent? Obstreperous? Recalcitrant?

Grantaire: I was gonna say "cray-cray".

-

Courfeyrac: You know you've made it when you see your picture up everywhere you go.

Enjolras: Courfeyrac... Those are our wanted posters.

-

Grantaire: The Ocean is a soup.

Combeferre:

Combeferre: Do elaborate.

Grantaire: What are needed for something to be a soup?

Combeferre: Erm... Water, salt, some form of vegetation, and personally I prefer some meat in mine.

Grantaire: *Tilts head*

Combeferre: The Ocean is a Soup.

Grantaire: The Ocean is a Soup.

-

Bossuet: Okay, it's obvious that you're not over this whole "Grantaire, you are incapable of believing, of thinking, of willing, of living, and of dying" thing, yet.

Grantaire: What makes you say that?

Joly: We found you in the park throwing rocks at children.

Grantaire: WHY SHOULD THEY BE HAPPY?!?

-

Musichetta: How did you break your leg?

Eponine: Do you see those porch stairs?

Musichetta: Yes.

Eponine: I didn't.

-

Grantaire: Hey Apollo? If my apartment burned down would you let me stay with you?

Enjolras: Yes of course I would!

Enjolras: Wait... Grantaire?

Enjolras: Grantaire come back!!!

-

Bahorel: We both look very handsome tonight.

Feuilly: You know you could have just said looked good and I would have said "So do you?"

Bahorel: ... I couldn't take that chance.

-

Courfeyrac: What's the word for when your hands are bisexual?

Combeferre: Do you mean ambidextrous?

Courfeyrac: I'm in love with you.

-

Valjean: so I have this rock, it's very beautiful. Javert gave it to me.

Fantine: I watched him throw it at you

Valjean: he's very sweet.

[roadtophantom]

Let your S(e)oul take you where you long to be - pt 1

a.k.a. finally writing my phantom korea travelogue

Watching Phantom in Korea has been this big goal of mine since December 2012.

When I saw the vast spread of Phantom merchandise at the Blue Square theatre and how they decked the theatre with a Phantom tree and had all sorts of Phantom-themed food, it became crystal clear that Korea goes hard for Phantom like no other, and I wanted to be part of that action.

I planned to visit Seoul when the World Tour revival was slated to visit in 2020, but that one got axed and squashed as a pandemic would do to hopes and dreams.

Cut to October 2021, news of a new Korean production got out around, but I was pessimistic. The borders were still closed and who knew for how much longer. Even as they started reopening toward 2022, there was a quarantine / covid-19 test requirement upon arrival. Then our local Korean embassy started taking a hardhanded stance on applications that made it difficult for visas to be issued. Add to that, the fact that the embassy have limited slots every month.

The odds were wildly stacked against me, but travel restrictions eased up and nothing serves as a better motivator than watching people you know actually go to the place.

Months of mental prep, doing things for the first time, and many expenditures later, I was deemed worthy of a visa. The next step was a ticket to the show…which was an entirely different main quest on its own.

Buying show tickets in Korea is like a national sport

I witnessed this during the first waves of Phantom Seoul tickets sale. The moment the dates open, you would find most of the tickets are already gone. So you are left to buy what's left but even when you manage to click on one, another person is likely completing their purchase ahead of you.

I did manage to snag a Jeon Dong-seok ticket. But the Cho Seung-woo one, I didn't manage to get until a month later.

I have to pause and thank @fadinglandtragedy for actually answering my questions, providing valuable tips, and encouraging me when I myself have given up lol.

The beauty of tickets in Korea is you can actually cancel and if you are early, you can get your money back with minimal processing fee. That means cancellations peek now and then when the ticket vendors refresh their systems everyday. I was able to move to a better row for my JDS show, and I eventually managed to buy my CSW ticket (that no one fought me for 😭😭😭😭😭).

But it took extreme patience, nightly refreshes, and trying not to nod asleep. It was worth it in the end.

So I only had to find a decent airfare, accommodations, and wake up insanely early to catch the flight, and print out all the things to prove to the immigration officer that I'm not pulling a Valjean on his Javert. 🥲🥲🥲

Tip: Overseas fans can buy through Yes24 and Global Interpark, but I highly recommend Yes24 for the exclusive ticket sleeves and the fact that they have a mobile app that you can use to book, stalk last-minute tickets, and eventually claim them.

Tip 2: For faster purchase using Yes24, look into loading your cc info in Paypal so you'd just be one click away to everything. For some reason I found the native cc method a bit harder to deal with (and it charged me more for some reason).

Korea things and hopefully an actual review to follow!

[theinfinitedivides]

also in a post that is quite possibly about to be the most out there thing i have said about this show to date i would like to present the possibility that Jun Mo placing his wedding ring on the headstone of Ki Cheol's grave next to Eui Jeong's necklace is not just the surface of an extremely f*cked up final proposal and acknowledgement of the OT3 that was formed (and did mostly hold up until the bitter end) but also a way of framing Jun Mo as the Javert of this Les Misérables, telling Valjean that he has won. no where are you going come back i wasn't finished yet bc see it's the parallels. you have to understand it's Jun Mo having his sole focus as hunting Ki Cheol down finishing the job and getting his promotion and somewhere along the way realizing that the lines have blurred. it's the roles being fluid enough that they switch frequently throughout the show bc it is Ki Cheol who asks why Jun Mo let him go. (bit of a side note here for context but i didn't realize what he meant until i went back and saw that the engine was still running. the key for the handcuffs was there in plain sight on the passenger seat he wanted him to leave. to run away from it all like Hae Ryeon bc even when the mask was off he didn't want him to get hurt. ah. i see.) and even though in the original novel Valjean lets Javert go and then Javert lets him go it is Javert that asks why in every adaptation that i have seen to date. i'm reminded of the '98 version with Liam Neeson and their final meeting by the Seine when in TWOE they are all crammed into that tiny apartment but it is Valjean, who dies much too early here. it is Javert who is left to pick up the pieces, and then he too dies inside himself. the raindrops on the gravestone are the Seine in miniscule the ring is the letter he wrote him walking away is the final plunge into the abyss. here, Javert ceases to exist. here, Valjean is the only one that is truly free even in death. someone play As Flowers Bloom and Fall from the OST for Sado pls we're going to need it

[verfound]

Magic Hat 102?

😂😂😂

did you know the Nonny before this asked for 101?

102 is called "Ordered Chaos" and is an Anarka & Roger fic.

One of my longest-running headcanons is that Anarka and Roger are old childhood friends.  I’ve kicked it around here and there in various fics (mentions of a shared past, drinking nights, “Uncle Roger”, etc.), but this one was where I was attempting to really dig into it?

The gist of the idea is usually that Anarka and Roger went to school together, and Roger had a bit of a rebellious streak before Something Serious happened, his father put the fear of God in him, and he “straightened up” and became “respectable” (this is usually around the time I have Anarka meeting Jagged; Roger and Anarka go their separate ways, but there’s always that history).

I don’t have much, honestly…

Roger Raincomprix came from a long line of respected law officials, probably dating all the way back to Inspector Javert.

(Anarka Couffaine did not.)

You could probably say that law – order – was in his blood.

(Her type was A-, for No Authority.)

Roger learned from a young age what it meant to be a model citizen.  His father was an officer, and his grandfather chief of police.  It was expected he would follow in their stead.

(Anarka’s grandfather was old money and stodgy rules.  Her father was a rebel who had married a hippie on the back of a camel his first year abroad.  He had fled to Paris when she was two.  He had been forced back to the Hebrides by the time she was five.  He had divorced her mother and remarried someone more respectable within the year, and she had been left in his care when her mother had decided family wasn’t worth it, dropped her on his doorstep, and fled for…somewhere.  Anarka had been too young to remember the where, just that it was on a plane that had never made it to its final destination.)

(…no one ever expected anything of Anarka once the respectable babies came along.  She was just expected to live, and live quietly, so of course she chose to Live Loud instead.)

[ferociousconscience]

💫 8 javert, 12 simplice, 11 fauchelevent 👀🍷

i know who you are……………. hi ❤️

Original ask game post is here - Please do send me more! LM characters greatly preferred, but I'll take Anna Karenina and other such lit characters, try me!

What's something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you despise?

For Javert - Despise is a strong word!!! I will say that I frankly don't feel altogether too comfortable answering this question in a public forum where I have many people I esteem following me :( But I will say that Javert is sincerely the most misunderstood character in this whole fandom. Pretty much every "Javert Gripe" post I see that floats around (seemingly every week) is just stunning to me, in an "are we even reading the same book?" kind of way. On a more positive note, I have my own Javert-centric historical research meta in the oven, in the same vein as the wonderful @patron-minette 's meta posts (Hi Anna! I'm making it real!). It'll take some time to release anything-- There's much to do, much to read (de Maistre's philosophy my beloathed), much to translate (vidocq's memoirs my beloved)-- but I hope it expands upon this question in a way that both honors the character I love so much and respects the fandom that I'm a part of.

What's a headcanon you have for this character?

For Simplice - This is of no consequence to her as she is in the story, but because of her comparison to Sister Perpetua (a peasant) and the whole "gratifying in a drawing room" line, I do think that her original family comes from some minor (bought) nobility, or at least her parents had some money. Her family probably summered in the Calais region, but had too many daughters, and she was one of the younger ones… so, due to her own deep convictions, she let it all go to join the congregation in MsurM around the same age as Javert joined the service, her mid-teens. I also generally headcanon her to be the same age as Javert, early 40s (vis a vis the "She had never been young and she never seemed to grow old" line. Middle of the road.)

Would you date this character?

For Fauchelevent - No, he's not tall dark and laconic enough but I would have incredibly fond feelings for that tomcat of an old man. He's just so clever!! And funny and witty, that peasant from Picardy. I adore his mind. He'd definitely be one of those old men who I would try to set up with some lonely old woman I know, just for their mutual enrichment.

[friendly-books]

Dresden files Storm Front live blog

Dresden files live blog  

I read the dresden files after reading Wedding Bells… No More like Hell’s Bells by @jadedragoness so this is going to be interesting. 

Storm front 

Murphy! I’m going to like you

Sqeee Marcone! And Hendricks!

We get Marcone in chapter two yay!

“A man of handsome and unassuming features” pg. 45 Bi Harry 1

“Good looking, tanned, athletic, and enthusiastic” pg. 46 Bi Harry 2

This was not the romantic met cute I wanted 

“He wanted to take a peek at my soul. He wanted to see what sort of man I was” pg. 50 Interesting implications 

Ugh male gaze 

“I borrowed a line from Johnny Marcone” pg.  59 Already 

Morgan you and Inspector Javert would get along. 

Mister! 

Bob! :)

Toot-toot! 

Why did you attack Harry Bianca? What was your plan here? If Harry did kill Jennifer what do you think you can do against him? If Harry didn’t kill Jennifer then you just attacked an innocent man. 

Did Bianca kill Rachel? I think she killed her.

Beckitt’s? As in Demeter? 

He Who Walks Behind sounds like a name with all its capital letters.

Harry forgot about his date with Susan oh no

Morgan is the worst the absolute worst 

Harry using the power of a storm is cool

I like Susan she seems fun

More Marcone yay

Harry put on a show that poor building what did it ever due to you?

“You should have known me better than that Mr. Dresden” It was my turn to frown “You’re right. I should have” pg. 260 Yes you really should have, you’ve seen his soul Harry. 

“Then he smiled for a fraction of a second” pg. 262 Harry already making Marcone smile 

“Harry” pg. 262 Already talking with first names. I know Harry won’t like that but my shipper heart adores it. 

“Good luck. I think it would be best if you and I did not encounter one another in the future. I cannot tolerate any more interference in my affairs'' pg. 263 Pfff that’s not going to happen. Marcone is definitely showing up in the next book. 

Harry’s dad no now I’m sad 

Harry buddy I talk to myself occasionally but this is a bit much. 

“Fuego” pg. 278 Is this the first bit of fire magic in the book? I think it is. Pretty late to show off Harry’s classic spell.

Victor isn’t very smart because he is summoning a demon.

The fight was cool! 

I’m glad Murphy is ok and threw the flowers at Harry. I’m glad they’re friends again. I’m glad Harry got his date with Susan. I like that Toot-toot got his pizza in the end. 

Final thoughts I like all the characters so far. Not a fan of the male gaze. I’m absolutely a Harry/Marcone shipper thanks to @jadedragoness. Let’s see how far the Bi Harry counter can go. “He wanted to take a peek at my soul. He wanted to see what sort of man I was” Has interesting implications in that Marcone seems to know what a soul gaze is and he knows about magic. Not sure if I’m reading too much into it. Not a fan of Morgan he needs to take a chill pill and stop being such a Knight Templar. I’m pretty sure Bianca killed Rachel which isn’t great. Like lady you could have stopped before you drained Rachel dry. Bianca isn’t the smartest person around. I didn’t realize that the Beckett’s were all the way back in book 1. He Who Walks Behind is differently coming back. Like you don’t have a name like that and not be important. The fight scenes were cool. I thought there would be more spell slinging. Overall I liked it.

[breadvidence]

DAMMIT: I.I

On AO3

SUMMARY: Two suicidal old men with moral scrupulosity in a three-legged potato sack race towards domesticity. Dallas 2014/Brick crossover, all adaptation decisions arbitrary.

Note: Stylistically? A disaster. Structurally? Also a disaster. Plot? God, no. Posting schedule? I'm working on chapter 3 when all that exists of chapter 2 is a brief note about insurance as a hurdle to appropriate SNF placement. Every time I have a craft question my answer is "you only write once" (and you don't have a beta, either). Godspeed, reader.

⁂

The smell of Betadine—ah, Christ! He should’ve picked a higher bridge. But—was it predictable? After a lifetime believing himself on an unassailable height, here he is: still a poor judge of distances. 

⁂

Jean Valjean cannot rest. He is the animal brought to ground, heels damped by the hot breath of its hunter, who feels in its trembling breast the urge to turn and receive those terrible exhalations on its face. On the second day, he hears the noise of wheels in the driveway and waits in satisfied despair for the siren’s whoop. It is Cosette. He becomes prey of a different kind, now, to the questions she won’t ask of him, and the questions she waits for him to ask. What he offers, with his whereabouts during the riot a Charybdis and her history with the boy a Scylla, is to pretend they have already passed through this Strait of Messina, and beat oars in open waters: that is, he asks: “How is he?”

And so she chatters about Marius’ health with no acknowledgment that he has ever been her secret, or that her papa has uncovered it without her consent. He would rather a police interrogation. As when a particle catches the sun as it sinks into deep waters, so there is for him the flash of awareness that the silences are—what?—the particle is gone, and the illumination too fleeting; the man remains uneasy, but unenlightened; he ascribes his uneasiness to the buried topic, and not its burying.

They smile for each other, when she leaves for hospital visiting hours. Her embrace is tight and makes his sore muscles wake and moan, to which he gives no voice. Alone again, Jean Valjean falls to brooding. He fetches his phone.

Crowd control for the protest drew resources from all the surrounding precincts, so it takes three calls before he is told—Yes—Officer Javert?—Yes—well, not today; he’s not in today. When—? Well—! You’re a friend of his…? You didn’t hear—? He hangs up, hasty and less polite than is fair. Sweat on his hands makes the touchscreen of his phone half-unresponsive, B ylor h pital n m er, but it’s enough for Google to bring it up. The receptionist wants to know the patient’s full name, sir, and what about his date of birth? 

He’s more polite this time, sorry, take care, thank you.

Jean Valjean does not ask for favors. He makes a call anyway. One might wonder how Father Herbert manages the confessional—might imagine him exclaiming You did what! in answer to a parishioner’s sins—and the man shows no unusual subtlety in his expressions of shock that Jean Valjean should make a request of him, but he’s willing all the same. A priest is due his flock even under the rules of HIPAA, and Valjean has remembered rightly that Javert is Catholic. Father Herbert texts him the room number in the evening.

Cosette does not visit him the next day, thoroughly caught up in that boy, for which he tells himself he’s glad. He does not know how he would explain going to the hospital, or Javert, or the possible consequences, and expects he would remain silent even in her presence, which he knows to be an unkindness. Traffic is slow across the Margaret McDermott, the road rain-wetted and fog heavy on the face of the river, though the storms passed with the morning. He claws his fingers into the steering wheel, notices, releases them with a shock. It’s all of fifteen minutes—is that not close enough?

He will not recall later where he parks, or the route he takes to the correct unit.

The charge nurse recognizes him from Baylor’s yearly blood drive, and she alarms him with a warm greeting—he doesn’t like the recognition. Doesn’t want to trade on it. Does so. “Aileen,” he reads off her name tag. “So good to see you.” Pleasantries. Apologies. He is not present in himself even as he speaks and listens. There’s a man—yes, very sick, to be on this unit. No, not family. No one who would list him on their advanced directive, no. But, could he—? 

The name loosens her uncertainty. “Ah, that guy. I shouldn’t tell you—well. I don’t count a uniformed officer as a visitor, so I say he’s had none. You’re not close? Well, you’re kind. Is he normally so—I mean—is it the situation that has him…?”

When it becomes clear she wants badly to know, he offers a smile of the saddest species.

“Never mind,” she replies, in the tone of one who understands. She might think that being a suicide has maddened Javert, or that he has always been a bastard, but in either case she is satisfied. “I’ll show you to him.” 

Thirteen years gone, and the sounds of the hospital are still just echoes of Fantine’s last days. For all he saw the man days ago he expects the Javert of then: hair still more dark than gray, in uniform, sidearm in his hand—braced in a doorway, terrible in joy—struggling up from the floor with blood on his face. It is a shock when he is none of these things, but a long lank mass of flesh in a hospital bed. His sheets are rucked down and his gown rucked up, revealing the blued ladder of ribs, sick yellowish belly, curve of purple-mottled buttock, and there low on his pelvis the disconcerting glare of a lopsided wolf tattoo. His modesty is preserved as much by Valjean’s refusal to see as by fabric. Aileen tsks and sets him right.

“He’s on fifteen minute checks, I swear,” she says, in a tone which indicates the swear she means is fuck. 

Javert speaks, and though the volume is low, the words confused, the voice is familiar. Comfortingly? No; but it is good to know that in this abased body there is yet the spirit of the man, fractious.

“Well, it’s good of you to have left your lines alone,” Aileen returns, tartly. “Now, look, Ultime is here to see you.” 

“Ultime,” he spits, as if the name is vile in his mouth. He has never heard it, or in any case never in the context of Jean Valjean. Evidently he retains his ability to be hateful over nothing. The curiosity that seemed equally elemental to the man—that has quitted him; he does not turn his head.

Aileen moves the visitor’s chair forward and, with a wry smile, leaves. To sit at his ease seems impossible, but to hover—the uncertainty does not suit him. He has not come here in fear. He sits. For some time they are quiet together. Jean Valjean ventures, at last, to say the man’s name. 

Javert’s head moves loosely on his neck; his gaze lacks astonishment, his lips are pursed. “Again,” he mutters, as if to himself. “Sure. Why not!”

Black reverie has brought Jean Valjean to this hospital room, not thought. The unpleasant process of waking begins. 

“When I looked for you—where were you?—nowhere. Well, in custody already, dead, whatever. I’d get over it. Then you’d turn up underfoot like a fucking LEGO piece. Or like a—a rock in your shoe, but when you take the shoe off and shake it, nothing comes out—and you put it back on—and the rock is still there.” The hands he frees from underneath the blanket shake. He does not seem to know what he meant to do with them; they grasp at nothing. “Here you are, then, even though I don’t have my shoes. So! what do you want?”

“You said you would wait,” he says.

“I lied, evidently.” His face is swollen—not bruised, but retaining fluid—and the effect is unkind. The grimace he makes would have been awful of itself. “I didn’t think, when I said it—I didn’t think about lying. You had nowhere to run. What does that matter, though? I did the running. Didn’t expect you’d chase, though. Are you gloating? No; my instincts are all wrong. Here to dispense kindness, that’s what it is. Going to pay my hospital bills? Don’t bother. Those are a dead man’s debts, and there’s no next-of-kin who will have to pick up the tab.”

Jean Valjean waits for Javert to ask another question for himself to answer. The memory is faint—he recalls mostly how it felt to watch from outside himself as he was denounced and saved and damned, and it has been over a decade—but he recalls that in an extremity of emotion this man does not need a partner to converse. Can’t remember the words spoken, only the sense: Ah, this is very strange. On the second iteration, it is still strange. He is less annoyed, now. He has nowhere to be.

“Well?” asks Javert.

“Ah,” says Jean Valjean. This proves inadequate to draw a response. He admits, “I don’t understand you or your actions.”

In a low, aching voice, Javert says, “I couldn’t see the river.” He pauses for a long while, then goes on, “I let you go, you son of a bitch. I felt my fingers open. In fact—I never touched you. God, God, I’m embarrassed. I’m like a dog licking your fucking criminal hand. Do you feel it?”

“What?” Jean Valjean remembers the man’s touch on his shoulder, forebears to mention it. “No.” 

“Pay attention.” Javert looks into Jean Valjean’s face with the eyes of a man who stares directly into the sun, pupils gone to nothing. It is the opiates. It should be very easy to tell what color his irises are, but under the terrible hospital lights they seem to be no color at all. “I can’t breathe.”

Jean Valjean looks with some concern at the monitors, which tell him that Javert’s ox-sat is at ninety-eight percent. 

“You want to know why I have done it? There is something beyond duty,” Javert whispers to him. “I think it may be named mercy. Or mercy is a part of it.” His face, not being made for grief, looks instead furious, even as he begins to weep. “I don’t know. I feel it, but I don’t understand. Ah, no! I do know—you should have shot me. I should have yelled for those boys to shoot me.”

“You aren’t making sense,” Jean Valjean says. Despairs.

“You would know,” snips Javert, “about not making sense. You’ve fucked sense.”

Jean Valjean watches the compressed peaks of the man’s heart rate and wonders if he should fetch a nurse.

“Fucked it,” Javert mutters. Then he clasps his hands over his breastbone in an attitude of dignity, for all his wretched expression, his tears. “Go on, then. You aren’t arrested, are you? I can’t arrest you, anymore. I accomplished that much—wrong kind of termination, but it’ll do, for now.” He adds, with the tone of those who are deeply in the fog of drugs but have briefly found themselves in a place of clarity, “Actually, I doubt the paperwork is cleared yet, but functionally I am not an officer anymore.”  

“I see why there are fifteen minute checks.” 

“They are fair,” Javert agrees. One of his hands moves to touch his ribs, flutters, settles. Their rise and fall is uneven from emotion or injury. 

They sit in silence until the nurse comes for the check, but she only glances with surprise at Jean Valjean before withdrawing. He is glad; he has never taken it well, how they would drug Fantine out of her grief to better manage her. He is, also, not glad: it seems there should be relief for the terrible pain on this man’s face, which he understands to be connected to himself—how else, with those eyes fixed on him?—yet beyond any ability of his to touch. Is this the time for a discourse on suicide? It is a sin, and he is not unread on the topic. Yet it seems cruel and obscurely unfair to bring the shade of Judas Iscariot to this room. 

The silence, the smell of sickness, the grieving glare.

“So,” says Jean Valjean, “no APB, then?” 

“No.��� 

“That’s good of you,” Jean Valjean lies, who thinks it the act of a madman. 

This impression is not alleviated when Javert begins to laugh, waxy face flushing red. “I know,” he gasps. “It’s terrible.” He gags, chokes, he’s hurt himself.

With guilt-ridden relief for the interruption, Jean Valjean presses the call button.

⁂

How intolerable, to be alive and visited by fools. 

First that boy, Grosch, who proves they will put anyone in uniform these days—yes, he’ll even think poorly of his fellow officers; that’s what he’s become. Who pushed you, sir?—an idiot’s question. We’ll find them. There isn’t even satisfaction in the memory of his response when Javert declared “he’s here!”, as Grosch had the temerity to be confused rather than shocked, What do you mean, sir? Then the verbal fumbling, offensive questions—why does the precinct even pay for sensitivity training, when the officers absorb so little of the lessons? Disgraceful. 

Then—Valjean. But he does not have the right to call the man a fool, does he? He’s the one who lacks understanding. Probably. His opinion wavers. The thought comforts him that there will be no repeat of the visit, since the experience was surely as unpleasant for Valjean as for himself.

He ought to know the world contains no comfort. Not the next day—he is aware of a second surgery, if unsure of the specifics—not, he thinks, the next either—and here’s the nurse bitching at him about his IV line before she says, “Your friend has come to visit again.”

Those white curls bother Javert. The man’s official description still identifies him as gray-haired; the change dates from after his second arrest. He holds a tablet, an iPad, one of the new thin models, with which he fiddles as he sits down. “Hello, Javert.” 

He provides an appropriate pause for a response, but there are too many words pressing at the inside of Javert’s skull, and inconveniently none of them are the man’s current alias. A sniveling part of him wants to say Mr. Madeleine, that name which represents something simpler, if little less painful.

Apologetic, Valjean goes on, “I heard you didn’t have many visitors. I thought nobody might have been by to drop off anything for you to do. I remember how bored—ah. I know how boring hospitals can be.” He holds out the tablet.

“Goddamnit,” Javert says.

[for-the-love-of-javert]

For anyone who doesn't want to see my ai generated pics

Here are the tags that I'm currently using if you wish to filter them out of your dahsboard feed

#ai generated javert images

#ai genrated valvert pics

Any new ai tags I use from now on will be added to this list as and when applicable.

For anyone who isn't comfortable with ai images being used I apologise and it will be temporary until I'm happy enough with my ow drawings to use them i.e as illustrations in my fanfics.

The drawings I have posted to date were practice drawings and done for fun. Not really for any kind of special use though I don't mind them being reblogged. I post them as more of a reference to gage how my own drawing skills are improving/worsening/staying the same. I'm still in the process of finding a style that I prefer to draw in and I'm still working on improving my drawing skills as an when i have the time. Besides that I have other daily, routine irl things that take up my time too the main one being work, if I could afford not to work I would, I'm self employed and my job will never make me rich. So I gotta do it unfortunately. In september I'll be going back to college as well so that will take up some of my time too. Please be patient with me. I never intended for my use of ai genrators to be a long term thing and still don't intend for it to be.

[cloud-makers-make-pollution]

oh yeah i totally agree

and i meant melodies like in the soundtrack there could be a soloist playing a similar melody from another song to kinda subtly connect?? the scenes

so in the book, we hear a lot more about fantines backstory

so she was dating this dude and she was absolutely head-over-heels for him but he's like "meh it's just a side chick" or smth and so she was in this friend group and they all had bfs so they went on this quadruple date (there were four pairs) and the dudes told the girls they had a surprise for them and all the girls were super excited!! but the "surprise" was that all the bfs were leaving and the dudes saw it as a prank but for fantine (idk abt the other girls) it was like "omg this dude who was my main source of stability is fuckin gone" and she was left with custody of cosette so now she's gotta take care of herself and this little girl on her own (keep in mind fantine is like 25 at this point)

so she's wandering around tryna find somewhere to stay and she finds mrs. thernadier outside with her children (yeah the thernadiers had like a buncha kids including eponine and gavroche) and fantines like "oh u look like a good mom will u take care of my girl" and the thernadiers were like "yeah but you have to give us this outrageous amount of money" so fantine was like "anything for my bbg"

so fantine is left on her own with the thernadiers taking care of cosette and demanding way too much money and fantine would pay cuz she was being told that her girl was being taken care of, but she actually wasn't. the thernadiers were treating cosette like a slave, she was dressed in rags and barely fed, and everything that fantine gave the thernadiers was given to their other kids or they used it for idk what which is messed up cuz now fantine is being lied to AND is being milked for what little money she has

so now fantine is trying to find a job and she worked at this factory that the mayor (cough cough jean valjean) owns and runs but the ladies there are all gossippy bitches that get fantine fired so now she doesn't have a job and is steadily having to pay more and more to the thernadiers. so she's wandering around the street and some lady's like "i'll give u ten francs for your hair" (which was actually like quite a bit at that time idk look it up) and fantines like "ugh i have no money so ig so" and another dude's like "i'll give u 40 francs for two of your teeth" (why he wanted her teeth i'll never know) and fantines like "dhhdhs i need the money" so now she has no hair and is missing two teeth

shes still wandering around yk when these ppl r like "omg u need money? become a prostitute it pays very well" and she's like "screw it i've lost all my pride already" so now she's a prostitute but it STILL isn't enough cuz the thernadiers keep demanding MORE MORE MORE but she's just chilling on the street one day and some dude like assaults her and she fights back but gets the police called on her (knock knock it's javert, bitch) so now she's gonna get arrested but the mayor's like "nuh uh she didn't do anything" so javert and the mayor (cough cough jean valjean) are doing old man yaoi or whatever and fantine just leaves cuz the mayor lets her

but now fantine is sick so she's in the hospital with tb and all she wants is to see cosette. the mayor comes and visits and he promises that he'll take care of cosette and get her away from the thernadiers so she dies happy knowing that her precious little girl is safe

so yeah that was like fontine's entire story and it probably all sucks cuz i was typing really fast and not really going back for corrections lol. sorry for such a long read

what do you think? any input?

– ⚜️

this is the most beautiful rendition of fantines story I think I will ever have the blessing of reading like genuinely who are you and can we be best friends I’m loving this I laughed out loud multiple times my family thinks I’m texting a boy now which is rather amusing seeing as I’m gay asf but you know uhm

but yes the musical repetitions like in Come to Me the same tune is used in On my Own and when the Bishop is doing some holy baptising Christian god stuff with valjean that’s a very similar tune to Empty Chairs at Empty Tables and the tune for Lovely Ladies, like most of that song is what is in Turning Turning just Turning Turning is a lot softer and more somber, which could be intentional to idk show contrast between the prostitutes and the dead kids but still an outcome of the poverty if you get what I mean? oh and in Valjeans existential crisis that I’ve forgotten the name of that tune is the same as the tune in Javerts soliloquy which I think is artistic genius because it’s both characters, one of which who has been at the others neck the entire show, having a massive fucking realisation about their life and making a huge decision by the end which is awesome but obviously one ends in “yay let’s be better man and use an alter ago” and then other ends in “well looks like imma go jump off the bridge then” so obviously contrasting endings (intentional?) but still. I can’t think of anymore right now but yeah

and the Thenardiers other kids I think I’ve heard of them *cough cough ahem in fanfiction cOUGH* Eponine, Gavroche, Azelma, and two other boys that they got rid of? Or sold? I’m not too sure I did some research but it was late and I learned virtually nothing

but oh this was awesome I’ve finally gotten to go on about the music and how far I’ve looked into it and thought about it because I have nothing else to do this is great

also the melodic similarities could be due to the fact that they had a very very short time to write the musical right so maybe repeated tunes was the way to go but idk I’m just theorising at this point 😭

[crackspinewornpages]

Les Misérables 60/365 -Victor Hugo

51

In this town, the young men spend fifteen hundred francs the same as one in Paris spends three hundred thousand. “grow old as dullards, never work, serve no use, and do no great harm.”p.130 If Felix stayed out of Paris, he would have been one. The richer are dandies, (a man devoted to style) the poorer are idles among the unemployed, bored and dreamers. In January of 1823 one of these dandies bowed to each lady, he saw in the street and told the one with no teeth to get out of his face. (as we see style is to compensate for lack of character) As her back was turned, he put snow down her dress and on instinct she turned to attack him, Javert seized Fantine and the dandy took the moment to escape.

52

Javert dragged Fantine to the police station, “This class of woman is consigned by our laws entirely so the discretion of the police. The latter do what they please, punish them, as seems good to them, and confiscate at their will those two sorry things which they entitle their industry and their liberty.”p.131 Javert wrote his report, entering judgment of condemnation. He sentenced her to six months and wouldn’t have sympathy as she cried and pleaded how she would earn money to send to her daughter, how she defended herself. (the law has always been biased against the lower class and ill reputed haven’t they)

A few minutes earlier, a man entered but no one paid him attention, he heard Fantine’s pleas. He stopped the soldiers from taking her and Madeliene orders Javert to let Fantine go but Fantine spat in his face. He wasn’t fazed and Fantine calls him a monster that caused all her suffering by dismissing her from the factory. Then tells Javert how he wronged her before taking her leave since she’s free to go. Javert exasperated at the audacity of it all tries to talk sense into Madeliene but he quotes the law, Javert is out of bounds and Fantine watched them as if they held a combat for her and her child’s life, Madeliene saved her. Her hatred crumbled and he apologized for being ignorant of her and he’ll handle everything and she was overwhelmed she collapsed.

BOOK SIXTH JAVERT

53

Madeliene had Fantine taken to the infirmary in his house, she became lucid the next morning as Madeliene is praying for martyrs on high and below. He learned about her plight and paid off her debts and had a letter sent to fetch Cosette but Thenardier won't let the cash cow go and rises the price. In this time Fantine didn't recover as the nuns grew softer to her as she wanted her child by her as God’s pardon. As weeks passed, Cosette didn’t come as she wasted and got worse and the doctor said if she’s to see her daughter, make haste to get her. Thenardier still didn’t let her go saying she was too sick to travel and Madeliene made up his mind to get her himself but something came up. (as it always does)

54

As Madeliene was in his office Javert appeared, having gone through a struggle internally over Madeliene. With genuine humility, Javert confessed to feeling in respect towards him, so his duty is to be dismissed. Six weeks ago, after that scene with Fantine. he informed against him to a Prefecture in Paris as an ex-convict Jean Valjean, who disappeared after robbing a Savoyard. The real Valjean had been found, a Father Champmathieu was arrested for robbery and an inmate recognized him as Valjean, enough circumstantial evidence.

Of course, Champmathieu denies he is Valjean for a lesser sentence than life in the galleys, he’s will go to trial as a witness. Madeliene tells him there is other business and police regulations he must do and finds out the date for the trial. He won't dismiss Javert over is mistake but Javert says he’s been so severe as to denounce a respectable man, if he wasn’t severe to himself all his justice will be undone. He doesn’t deserve kindness, he deserves to be made an example of, but will serve until he is replaced. (you know I could make a joke here but I’m just amazed a cop is taking accountably even if he is a fictional one)

BOOK SEVENTH THE CHAMPMATHIEU AFFAIR

55

After Javert’s visit. Madeliene went to visit Fantine and keeps assuring her Cosette will be there soon. The doctor warned him she doesn’t have much time. Back in his office, he marked a road map of France.

56

He went to someone to get a horse and cabriolet for the trip when asked where he’s going Madeliene just repeats the time to show up. Madeliene leaves insurance for the horse and cabriolet, more than they are worth. At home, his cashier listened to his nervous pacing all night.

57

Of course, you already know Madeliene is Valjean (not like it was hard to infer it) and what happened after Gervais, he became a totally different man as the Bishop wished. He sold the silver and wandered from town to town where he settled and established the factory and lived in peace. Until Javert, then his first thought was to denounce himself, but then decided to wait and see. “He repressed this first, generous instinct, and recoiled before heroism.”p.150 It would have been beautiful after the Bishop’s words, but it wasn’t so. (well we need conflict)

At Fantine’s bed he had a vague feeling he must go to Arras and went about his day until he was home, riddled with anxiety. He deluded himself in solitude, did Champmathieu really resemble him, how will it end, what can be done. Gradually, over hours, he came to an answer. He knew hearing that name would cause his new life to vanish and there, God gave him the opportunity to have, Madeliene be more respectable. His place in the galleys was waiting for him that Champmathieu would take. Javert had hunted him but was thrown off, does he have a right to disarrange fate, it is God who wills it so he can continue to do good.

But he continued to ask himself and confessed that it was monstrous to do nothing. He was reopening a door to his past, morally murdering a wretched man, feeling the Bishop was there he had to go to Arras. “He would enter into sanctity only in the eyes of God when he returned to infamy in the eyes of man.”p.154 He makes preparations and letters, the concealment of his name, his life, so distinct they separated into light and darkness antagonistic but good was gaining the upper hand. The Bishop was the first phase of his life, Champmathieu is the second. Tried to reason that Champmathieu isn’t totally innocent, but the heroism of his deed might be taken into consideration and the last seven years, (there was a news story years ago that a guy that was supposed to be in prison for ten years was never taken to prison and the judge let him go because he reformed himself) but it was the theft of Gervais that put him here.

He detached himself that he must do his duty, if he did nothing his good works would be tainted with crime. “virtue without and abomination within, or holiness within and infamy without.”p.155 He had resolved against himself but then remembered Fantine and what would happen to the town and people he’s provided for, it would all die. (pay attention to this) And the child, if the mother dies what would become of her. Champmathieu goes to prison guilty of theft and he remains doing more good.

He believes he is right to stay Madeliene, claim nothing of Valjean, he’s another man now. He opened a secret compartment where lay his old clothes, recognizable to those that saw Valjean at Digne, he had saved the candlesticks. He threw all into the fire that still held a piece of Valjean. A voice seemed to say forget the Bishop, forget everything, destroy Champmathieu’s, enrich the town as Madeliene. (is this an angel demon thing)

His conscience seemed to speak to him, he put the candlesticks back on the mantlepiece. He paced around the room, two ideas, stay silent or denounce himself, he should never be free or loved again, stay in paradise a demon, go to hell as an angel. What should he do, whatever the choice something in him will die.

58

He paced for five hours until he collapsed in a chair and had a nightmare he was with his brother from childhood along a road where everything was dirt colored, his brother was no longer with him in Romainville. He went into an empty house there was a silent man everywhere he went. In the fields he saw a crowd following him and one told him he is dead. (this just reminded me of those Arthur problem solving dream sequences) He woke up then as his horse and cabriolet arrived.

59

Any mail from Arras sent at one at night would arrive in the town by five in the morning. A man drove faster than the mail wagon, he was going to Arras as something urged him forward with no plan. He would prefer not to go to Arras where there was Javert and two convicts who could identify him, but he was going. At the stop in Hesdin the wheel was damaged and the wheelwright can't have it fixed until tomorrow. He can borrow an old calash but no horses to pull it or ride.

Madeliene felt Providence was intervening in his continuing the journey, if he didn’t make it, it wasn’t his fault. Since Javert’s visit the iron hand that held his heart let go. If his conversation with the wheelwright taken place in private no one would have overheard him, but it was in the street and attracted a crowd. A young boy heard and ran off and returned with an old woman who offered to help and the iron hand returned. (could you make a case that the devil is giving him obstacles to give up and God is going him opportunities to continue)

She had a worn-out spring cart but it could get to Arras and he paid to resume on the road. He admitted when the cart moved, he felt joy and found it absurd that he should feel that at turning back on a willing journey. As he left the boy stooped him as he wasn’t paid for his service but Madeliene sped off leaving him nothing. (douche at least toss him a coin) He already lost time in Hesdin and the roads were bad in February.

He stopped again in Saint-Pol four hours later, another hour he was at Tinques, five more leagues (a league is about 3.4 miles) until Arras. His horse was starting to tire as someone told him Arras was seven more leagues away because of road repair. He got directions and a new horse but at the crossroads his cart broke and twenty minutes and a DIY repair later he was at a gallop. Another hour he’ll reach Arras by eight and he didn’t know the hour for the trial. (seems like something you should have found out)

60

Fantine awoke joyful, she had a good dream as she was delirious and the doctor ordered to be informed the moment Madeliene came back. A few months before Fantine was a shadow of herself, illness improvises old age. “Physical suffering had completed the work of moral suffering.”p.170 As the time Madeliene’s visits approached, he didn’t come by five, Fantine began to sing what lulled Cosette to sleep. A servant informed the Sister that Madeliene went out that morning, Fantine demanded to know why he won't come. The Sister wouldn’t lie to her (her whole thing is not lying) and just said he had gone away and Fantine believes he had gone for Cosette.

Fantine laid back down and told the Sister of her daughter, she’s seven now so pretty and has beautiful hands. (this is called irony since we know how horrible Cosette looks but Fantine doesn’t) She believed she would see her again soon and he’ll be here with her tomorrow. When the doctor came at eight, Fantine was thought to be asleep but she wasn’t and asked if her daughter could sleep beside her. The doctor explained to the Sister that Madeliene will be gone for days, best not to give bad news to Fantine. She seemed to be doing better and he believed if Madeliene came back with the child tomorrow the great joy may cure her. (I’m not sure about anyone else but in my family if someone is really sick to the point of their deathbed and then appear to get better they’re half way to heaven about to die)

NEXT

[sabakos]

@javert okay turns out that i cant resist talking about it, i do mean basically that, yeah, but I think that the specific technologies don't matter so much as the asymmetric challenges of implementation - if tools like glaze/nightshade don't become widespread they won't do anything to large datasets, and if they do become widespread (which is... highly unlikely, especially since most images in the datasets that these models are trained on aren't even art!) any sort of programmatic filtering solution quickly makes the herculean effort required to coordinate essentially useless.

I suspect the teams developing these technologies are more interested in the proof-of-concept and are participating in the standard academic practice of talking up the potential impacts of their own work, which is sadly being misinterpreted as some sort of tangible threat to future AI models rather than just an interesting intellectual exercise with few (if any) practical applications.

In the already unlikely event of some sort of "arms race" of AI training models vs data poisoners, the AI folks have the clear advantage here; it's much harder to get everyone to go along with some new technology to thwart image generation, and it's much easier to programmatically eliminate the threat of that technology from the other end no matter how many or how few artists must adopt it for it to "work". This is a coordination problem, having a team of one who constantly needs to stay up to date on the latest state-of-the-art is much easier than a team of one million, this is why computer security is so difficult and why Microsoft is so aggressive with pushing out security updates on Windows. And worse for the artists than Microsoft, any images "glazed" with an obsolete form of the technology would already be out in the wild and vulnerable to being used by a smarter learning model that could defeat the glaze - there's no way to "patch" an image that's already been copied and saved somewhere else!

Also, I suspect that this isn't really going to make people happy about AI art because none of these technologies actually address any potential threat to artists' jobs posed by AI? First, stable diffusion already out in the wild in multiple forms as a base that can be built off of, and furthermore the LAION 5B dataset has been saved off by some unknown number of people for historical purposes, which could easily be used to train new models in the future. The technology and is already here, etc. But also, if Disney or some other corporation decides to create a LoRA with each of their own trademarked characters for internal use and trains employees to create art with it as a way of saving labor, no defensive technology used on images outside the company would address that. So the proposed solutions are just (dubiously) addressing the anxiety of "they used/profited off of my work without my permission" and not any of the underlying material impact or the potential for large corporations to automate away artists' jobs.

Seeing an increasing amount of "anti-AI" technologies being created by developers who, in all probability, fully know that they won't actually work.

But that's none of my business...

[pilferingapples]

psqqa said:                                                                                                                            Do we have any notion of when Javert was born? If we have a date we could figure out what saint’s day it was, which would probably be a fair bet for Christian name also.                                                                                                              Were foundlings baptized? France feels like it would have required baptism. Or maybe not because baptism means paying the church for its services and who cares if poor people’s kids go to purgatory? I feel like it could go both ways. Anyway, my ultimate point here is that if they required baptism, Javert would have a first name. Although to be fair, it would probably just be Jean.                           

As to the first thing, we do have a pretty good idea of when he was born! His badge at the barricades says that he’s 55, so 1832-55 = Probably 1777?

An article here says (translation by @madmerchant )

“Before 1831 (that’s Javert) he received a single new name that served as his surname—a deliberate severance of ties, intended to prevent the natural parents from “abandoning” a child to be raised at the state’s expense and then simply finding him again afterwards by means of his name. (After 1831, a foundling received two first-names, one of which became his first name and the other his last name.) Each foundling was given a necklace with his registration number, to prevent trafficking in children; and when the doctor judged the child capable of travel, he was placed with a nurse or foster family.”

You can check out the whole translation here!

So the government wouldn’t have given Javert any name but “Javert” ; if his foster family/guardian decided to give him another name/ baptize him, that was up to them. But I’m not sure what “old enough to travel” would consist of, or whether the people taking him as a charge would have bothered?

(also relevant here; born in 1777, Javert would be about 12 in 1789-- the start of the Revolution. and after that the relationship between the French government and the Catholic church changed a lot, and very quickly. So I’m not sure how that would affect things like foundling baptisms, and it probably varied wildly as the revolution went on!)

If anyone knows more about this please chime in!